caterwauls are my screams in the night from the back fence,
aimed at the inequitable situations in our present society and the ridiculousness of life's paths........
With a little silliness too . . . for sanity.

Monday, March 28, 2011

What's going on in Japan? We hear a different tune radiating from Fukushima each day! The officials of the company operating the nuclear facility say the radiation levels are sky high. Then they say they were mistaken, they are low and not a risk to human health. Except perhaps babies! Then it changes again. Water, milk and food are becoming dangerous.

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) that runs the plants say they do not believe the levels are high enough to be considered a risk to human health. How can Plutonium in the air, soil and water not be a threat to health? One particle of Plutonium the size of a grain of sand can kill you with a lethal dose of radiation if inhaled or left on the skin. Is it any wonder Japanese people no longer Believe anything TEPCO says?
Now it is leaking into the seawater and flowing north. Officials say it is harmless.
Smoke comes out of crippled reactors, but it's okay, officials say. Then they withdraw workers. Then we are told something else. We begin to wonder if the motivation for these officials is to save their business or the people?

Now the International Maritime Organization, a United Nations agency, says there is no medical basis for restricting shipping and that the waters are safe for shipping to pass the reactors on their way to Tokyo to unload containers!
And get this, officials tell us the radiation can be washed off your ship with soap and water!
WTF?!
Did you EVER see a ship being washed off with soap and water? Do you believe corporate owners of shipping lines will lift a finger to make those poor Indian and Filipino crewmen safe? Would they ever wash down their ships! With soap and water? How much would that cost? Do they believe that we, the world's population will say, it's okay, there is no radiation problem because they are going to wash their ships off! How gullible do they think we are?

When you wash your hands with soap and water the germs go down the drain. Where the &$#@ do they think the radiation will go after 'washing' these ships? And once the containers are refilled with TVs for North America, will they wash the containers too? Before our dock workers handle them?

Isn't it time we fired all the so called OFFICIALS and got someone else to monitor the problem? We can't trust these guys, they want to get back to opening their plants again when they should be sealed forever!
Obama let us down on the BP Gulf Oil spill by letting BP off the hook to monitor itself. And they only gave us lie after lie! What a joke! He should have seized the assets of British Petroleum to pay for the costs of watch-dogging them.
And some say it is still leaking in the gulf! And lying on the bottom so we can't see it.
So are we supposed to believe these Japanese officials too?
I don't think so.

We have so many instances of corruption in corporate facilities which influence the public that officials cannot be trusted. Look around your own local area and it is not hard to find instances harmful to you and your family. Yet corporations carry on with impunity. Trusting that their lobbyists and politicians on the company payroll will get them through the bad public relations. These incidents are far worse than bad PR, yet that is how they are treated.

Something needs to be done. Something drastic to get the attention of the corporate hegemony.
We need to wash these officials' mouths out with soap and water. Or worse. Make them work alongside the workers trying desperately to solve the problems.

We need to hold them responsible and stop allowing them to wriggle off the hook of public accountability.

Saturday, March 05, 2011

I was awake this morning at 4 AM. My little transistor radio battery was dying. It would only bring in a cowboy station. So I listened. Lulled at first until the lyrics began to register.
One song was a lament from a boy remembering getting kicked out of his home at 12 years old. Another was a sad recollection of all the things that woman had done to him. Then one of a guy who lent his wife the pickup truck and she stopped it on the railroad tracks. He was really in sorrow, even more so when he learned that she had jumped clear! Cowboys and depression seem to go together.
No wonder those guys were depressed up there on Brokeback Mountain. You can only look at clouds and sheep for so long until you turn to the next warm body in the sleeping bag.

CW lyrics are aimed at depression; you're a redneck heartbreak .... so hard living here on my own .... bad ridin' cowboy .... for 43 dollars my friend lost his life .... I've been burned, I've been cheated .... you can hide your tears, you can cry in the dark .... death is waiting for its dance .... my favorite dog is buried in the yard.

OMG, of course they're so depressing.
Cowboys have a rough time of it. Used to be just get out there and ride the fences, rope a lil dogie and dance and drink some whisky. Not now, they're filled with all kinds of guilt and regret.
Just look at their lives; they never get the girl any more. They ride ATVs instead of horses. Their bar has been taken over by some bling guy named Tiffany Dean. The train doesn't even run through town these days! Their six gun is outpowered by a Glock and their hat only holds four gallons. What's a cowboy to do but lament?

Cowboys can't even go to Texas now because someone else's exes all live there and you know what exes are like. Rodeo Drive is off limits unless you have Tony Lama boots. And cow poop stuck under the heel just doesn't fly. Alberta is frozen up most of the year and so are the steers. And Hiyo Silver just means the silver market is up 20 points!

Drivin' with my Babe in my pickup truck,she love the fresh air back there in the box.Headin' for my bar an' with a little bit of luck,we'll drink all night unaware of the clocks.

Ol' Rover dawg beside me on the passenger seat,gotta get a move on I hear a choo choo train.My Babe wears a mini skirt and lookin` so sweet,got a Bud between my knees and feelin`no pain.

Gonna dance all night, have some fun with my friends,snuggle with my Babe, have her body next to mine.Win a game of poker, till the big money ends get the cash inside my pocket, feelin mighty fine.

Put my foot to the floor, get this ol`Ford goin`Gotta get to that crossin, before the red lights flash.Dawg just a howlin`, rain and wind now blowin`Locomotive got there first .... cowboy got the crash.